Archive guide
Declassified documents
A declassified record is not a public document like any other: it is something somebody decided should not be read, and that today can be read. This page explains the differences between the terms in use — declassified, desecretato, FOIA, unsealed — and indexes the records of this kind that Unclessify has made readable.
Four words that are not synonyms
Declassified
A record created under a security classification — confidential, secret, top secret — from which the originating authority has since removed that classification. The text may arrive with passages withheld: the redactions stay visible as such.
Desecretato
The Italian term for the same act: the secrecy covering a record is lifted. It appears most often for the papers of parliamentary commissions of inquiry and for judicial files.
FOIA release
Not necessarily classified: simply never published. It becomes public because somebody formally asked, often after years and sometimes after an appeal. A reasoned refusal is itself a document.
Unsealed
This concerns court papers: an indictment or an order stays under seal while an operation is running, and becomes public when the judge so orders.
What this archive holds
As this page was built the archive holds 3 records classified as declassified, from 1 distinct sources, with documents dated between 1963 and 2026.
- 3 document
The count is derived from the catalogue at every build, not written by hand: if the archive grows, this page grows with it. The label is assigned only when a record states its own provenance — a declassification, a FOIA release, an unsealing — or when it comes from a declassification archive. A record born public, however authoritative, does not receive it.